From: mongo@biteme.com   
      
   https://scdailygazette.com/2025/11/14/death-row-inmate-set-to-become-3rd-   
   in-sc-executed-by-firing-squad/   
      
   Death row inmate becomes 3rd in SC executed by firing squad   
      
   Stephen Bryant pleaded guilty to killing three people during a crime spree   
   in 2004   
      
   By:Skylar Laird   
   -   
   November 14, 2025 3:22 pm   
      
   Editor’s note: This article has been updated with the execution.   
      
   COLUMBIA — A Sumter County man who killed three during a crime spree 21   
   years ago became the third person executed in South Carolina by firing   
   squad.   
      
   Stephen Bryant was the fifth person executed in South Carolina this year   
   and the seventh since the process resumed in September 2024. Bryant   
   pleaded guilty in 2008 to fatally shooting three people during a string of   
   burglaries.   
      
   The 44-year-old was declared dead at 6:05 p.m. He gave no last words.   
      
   Nationwide, 42 people have been executed this year, according to the Death   
   Penalty Information Center.   
      
   Bryant’s attorneys made a single final appeal to attempt to halt his   
   execution, arguing lower courts never heard evidence that he suffered from   
   fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. The state Supreme Court rejected that   
   argument, allowing his execution to go ahead. Unlike in other executions,   
   Bryant’s attorneys did not appeal that decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.   
      
   As expected, Gov. Henry McMaster chose not to commute Bryant’s sentence to   
   life in prison. No South Carolina governor has done so in at least the   
   last half-century. This time, Bryant’s attorneys didn’t even ask, but   
   McMaster released a denial anyway.   
      
   Bryant opted to die by firing squad instead of lethal injection or   
   electrocution, the other two methods allowed in state law. South Carolina   
   is now tied with Utah with the highest number of executions by firing   
   squad. Utah is also the only other state to execute an inmate that way   
   since the death penalty resumed nationwide in 1976.   
      
   Three members of victim Willard Tietjen’s family held hands in the front   
   row of the witness room.   
      
   Beside them sat one of Bryant’s attorneys, representatives for the 3rd   
   Circuit Solicitor’s Office and the Sumter County Sheriff’s Department,   
   said prisons spokeswoman Chrysti Shain.   
      
   Like the other inmates executed by firing squad, Bryant’s legs and arms   
   were strapped down. He wore a black jumpsuit and mittens over his hands. A   
   sling around his chin restricted his head movement, media witnesses said.   
      
   Bryant did not seem to react to anything happening in the room. After   
   glancing at the witnesses, Bryant kept his attention ahead of himself, his   
   breathing normal. Guards placed a hood over Bryant’s head just after 6   
   p.m. About a minute later, they raised the shade that separates the room   
   where the marksmen stand from the death chamber.   
      
   The marksmen fired at 6:02 p.m.   
      
   A small, white target with a red bullseye affixed to Bryant’s chest flew   
   off with the impact, witnesses said. He appeared to take several more   
   shallow breaths, then spasmed once. A doctor spent about a minute   
   examining Bryant before declaring him dead, witnesses said.   
      
   For his last meal, Bryant requested Asian food, Shain said. He had spicy   
   mixed seafood stir fry over rice, fried fish over rice, two egg rolls,   
   three stuffed shrimp, duck in soy sauce, two Zero candy bars, German   
   chocolate cake and two Pepsis. Bryant ate his last meal Wednesday evening.   
      
   Bryant’s final wish was for no one in need to face the same rejection he   
   did when he sought help for his mental health but was denied care because   
   he couldn’t pay for it, his attorney, Bo King, said in a statement.   
      
   “That is consistent with the man we knew, who showed grace and courage in   
   forgiving his family and great love for those in and outside of his   
   prison,” King said in the statement. “We will remember his unlikely   
   friendships, his fierce protectiveness, and his love for nature, the   
   water, and the world. We will miss him.”   
      
   The crimes   
   Bryant was still on probation following three years in prison for   
   attempted burglary when his deadly crime spree started Oct. 5, 2004, with   
   a Sumter County home robbery. His plans, however, began before that,   
   attorneys argued during his 2008 sentencing hearing.   
      
   For several days, Bryant drove his blue-and-white pickup truck around   
   rural Sumter County, approaching isolated homes and spinning tales to   
   anyone who answered the door when he knocked.   
      
   On Oct. 4, Bryant came to the home of Tom Dennis, which sat on several   
   hundred acres of property far back from the road. Bryant told Dennis his   
   brother stole his pickup truck and he needed help getting it out of a   
   ditch, Dennis testified in court.   
      
   Dennis helped Bryant out and thought little of the interaction. The next   
   day, Bryant returned to rob the house after Dennis left to attend   
   Clemson’s homecoming football game. When Dennis went out to his office in   
   an adjoining building the next morning, he discovered someone had stolen   
   his laptop, briefcase and bag of money.   
      
   Bryant repeated his method three days later with James Ammons, another   
   rural homeowner. That time, Bryant took only Ammons’ .40-caliber   
   semiautomatic rifle and the shells Ammons kept on the nightstand.   
      
   Over the following days, Bryant used that gun to shoot four people,   
   killing three.   
      
   The first came later that same day. Bryant went out to a popular fishing   
   spot along the Wateree River. He walked up and down the Richland County   
   side of the river, where Clinton Brown was fishing.   
      
   After a brief conversation, Bryant walked away. A few moments later, Brown   
   felt a shot in his back, he testified in court. When he turned around,   
   Bryant was already gone, he said.   
      
   Brown drove himself to the hospital, where he stayed for nine days but   
   survived the gunshot wound. Brown died in 2017, at the age of 69.   
      
   The next day, Bryant went to his friend Cliff Gainey’s house to smoke   
   marijuana and drink some beers, Bryant said in a later statement to   
   police. When the beers ran out, Bryant drove the two of them to a nearby   
   convenience store, where security video showed Gainey entering the store,   
   then returning to Bryant’s truck parked outside, according to court   
   records.   
      
   Bryant drove around for a while, until Gainey asked him to pull over so he   
   could “take a leak,” Bryant told police. In separate statements, Bryant   
   told police he thought Gainey was taking a knife out of his waistband,   
   then that he thought Gainey was making sexual advances toward him.   
      
   Regardless of what happened, Bryant shot Gainey three times, he said.   
      
   “I don’t know exactly why I shot Cliff,” Bryant later said in a statement   
   to police. “Only thing I can (think) is his actions brought back a bad   
   memory and I felt scared.”   
      
      
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